


Italian Class

by savesavesavesafe



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Albino Dave, Caliginous Romance | Kismesis, M/M, highschool
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-03-13
Updated: 2013-03-22
Packaged: 2017-12-05 04:39:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/718974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/savesavesavesafe/pseuds/savesavesavesafe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Quanti anni hai?” (How old are you?)</p>
<p>“I’m good, thanks”</p>
<p>“God fucking dammit, Strider. I asked you about your age”</p>
<p>“Oh, uh” he looks around for a moment </p>
<p>“Due?” (Two?)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Why the fuck am I wasting my Saturday night on this asshole I could be reading

**Author's Note:**

> I learnt Italian like, two years ago, so sorry if its a little fucked up. I tried though. I hope you enjoy and don't forget to post feedback thanks xo

“Quanti anni hai?” (How old are you?)

“I’m good, thanks”

“God fucking dammit, Strider. I asked you about your age”

“Oh, uh” he looks around for a moment

“Due?” (Two?) 

Your name is Karkat Vantas and you are currently attempting to help Douche bag mc fuckass here (Also known as Dave Strider) with his Italian test on Tuesday. It is a Saturday fucking night and he’s nowhere near prepared. You bottle your rage for this dumbass and attempt to help him again. You’re going to start from Scratch. 

“Do you know how to speak any Italian whatsoever?”

Dave Scrunches his nose and hesitates for a bit before he says “Does pizza count as an Italian word?” 

You sigh and nod your head. Dave smirks “well yes, yes I do know how to speak Italian”.

“That isn’t going to be on the test you ignorant piece of ass” you mutter under your breath

“It isn’t? Well shit, I really thought that I would pass with what I already knew” He leans on the edge of your couch and puts his hands behind his head. God, he’s such a sarcastic asshole. 

You two are currently sprawled across your living room floor, a sea of books surrounding you. You check your watch, 5:30. You still have one and a half hours of this fuckass to deal with. Why? Because your stupid fucking Italian teacher decided that tutoring other seniors who ‘struggle’ with this Goddamn subject is going to improve your communication skills. You know that she only asked you to tutor Dave was because no one else can fucking handle his stupidity when it comes to anything to do with Language. This asshole isn’t even your friend. In fact, he probably didn’t even know your name until last week.

“Alright, let’s start from the basics then, because you obviously never fucking payed attention in any Italian class for the past two fucking years” You get up and grab your 9th Grade Italian book and flip to the first page. It’s titled “l’a’ fabeto” (The Alphabet). You hear Dave groan.

“Can’t I learn how to say something cool? Like ‘I want to masturbate with a cucumber’ or something?”

“Stop acting like a fucking six year old. How are you even going to fucking pronounce those words without knowing the Alphabet? Now listen here, asshole”

 

You read out all of the letters and ask him to mimic you. Your teaching method is successful for at least ten minutes until you come across the letter ‘h’.

“So, you’re trying to tell me that ‘h’ is pronounced ‘acca’?”

“Yes, Dave. Not every country fucking says ‘h’”. He frowns a little and quietly says the word to himself over and over again. At least he’s attempting to learn. 

“Can we move onto the next fucking letter yet?”

“Shut up and let me learn how to pronounce this word, Vantas” 

Twenty minutes pass and he finally learns how to pronounce the alphabet. You feel fucking relieved. If there is a God, he’s decided not to be an asshole today.   
“OK, now do you think you can recite this shit to me right now without looking at it?”

“Hell fucking yeah” He clears his throat with a slight ‘ahem’ and cracks his fingers. Breathing in, he begins to recite the alphabet.

“A, bi, c”

“It’s pronounced chi like” you look around your living room and spot a familiar packet “like Cheetos”. He nods and continues. And holy shit, Dave fucking Strider manages to recite all 21 letters of the Italian alphabet. You give him nod of approval. It’s 6pm and the sun is about to set.

“Now before we finish learning the alphabet, you need to know the substitutes that Italians use for j, k, y, x, and w. Those are I lunga, kappa, ipsilon, ics and doppia vu. Got that?” Dave mouths them to himself and gives you a nod.   
You flip your book around ten pages ahead to face another title. This was called “I numeri” (The numbers) 

“okay, now we’re gonna learn how to actually say your fucking age because last time I checked you weren’t two years old” Dave looks confused for a moment realising what he had said before laughing at himself.

“Alright, lets learn these motherfucking numbers” 

 

Another twenty five minutes pass, and by then he learns all of the numbers up to twenty.

“Now Dave, I’m going to ask you the exact same question I asked you one hour ago, and you have to reply correctly. If you don’t, I’m going to punch your fucking face”  
He nods “I’m ready, master”

You take a deep breath in and hope that he fucking answers this correctly. 

“Quanti anni hai?” (How old are you?)

Dave hesitates for a second before replying

“Ho Diciasette anni” (I am seventeen years old)

You breathe out a sigh of relief and notify Dave of the fact that he is correct. He thrusts his thin, white arms up into the air and lets out a big “fuck yeah”. 

“so” Dave starts

“So?” you repeat.

“My bro isn’t picking me up for another 20 minutes. What are we going to do?”

“I don’t fucking know. Go read a book. Keep yourself entertained. Just don’t touch any of my shit” 

You pick up all of your text books and head upstairs to put them away.

“I’ll be right back, don’t touch anything”

You head upstairs and place your books away in your painfully organised bookshelf. Each row is labelled with a different sticker such as “school work”, “fiction”, “notebooks” etc. You enjoy being organised with your books; it assures that you’re most definitely reading/ using all of them. On the other hand, you take a look at the rest of your room. It’s probably the biggest clusterfuck anyone has ever laid eyes on. Your guitar lies on your bed along with your tablet. There is dirty unwashed underwear on your desk chair, and you swore you saw some sort of vermin crawl around yesterday. Yeah, you generally don’t take people in here. You exit the room and close the door behind you, hearing the lock slowly hatch back together. 

Walking down your stairs, you hear a slight giggle. As you move over to Dave, you finally see what the fuck he’s laughing about. Oh, hell no. How the fuck did he find your old baby pictures? 

“Dave, put that fucking book down I swear to God” Dave’s grin only grows bigger.

“You told me to read a book and yet, here you are telling me not to. Now if you excuse me, I am going to continue looking at your naked baby pictures. Thank you very much.” You snatch the book right out of his hands and begin to walk to your staircase.

As you’re about to reach the first step, an index finger pokes at your ribcage. You squeal and jump and the book falls out of your hand. Dave quickly picks it up and attempts to start looking at it again before you jump of his back and begin to try and snatch the book back. This goes on for several minutes until a bell rings. Your door bell to be more specific. You jump off and run to the door to great who you’re assuming to be, Dave’s brother. He wears similar glasses to Dave’s. Except a lot more anime and the collar of his off -white shirt is flipped up. What a fucking douche, oh my God. Dave Finally hands your book over again.

“Later Karkat” he says, clearly out of breath. His anime brother nods and they’re out of your house in no time. Thank Fuck. You really fucking hate Dave Strider. You can’t believe he’s seen your baby pictures. though you must admit, you were pretty fucking cute as a baby. You place the book away in a safe place where you know Dave won’t find it and move up to your room. There’s a few new messages on your pester chum, and you decide to check them for the rest of the night before you finally decide you should go the fuck to sleep. 

Right before you get into your bed, your phone vibrates

“Same time tomorrow? –TG” You manoeuvre your fingers over your phone keys

“Sure, Whatever” and that’s when you lock your phone and go to sleep. Tomorrow is going to be a long day.


	2. oh my fucking god its 8:30 am what are you doing here

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> don't forget to post feedback in the comments xo

((Dave’s point of view))

You ring the doorbell to be greeted by Karkat’s mother. She is wearing a grey business suit and her straight, black hair is tied into a tight bun. She strongly resembles Karkat in almost every physical aspect and you must admit, you’re slightly creeped out by it.

“Oh, you must be Dave!” She begins cheerily with a giant smile plastered on her face. She’s most definitely not like Karkat personality wise. You nod your head as you watch her turn around and yell up to the ceiling.

“KARKAT SOMEONE IS AT THE DOOR FOR YOU”

She smiles sweetly at you and tells you that she has to go to work now, but to make yourself comfortable in her house. You nod once again, give her a smile and walk into the house. You spot the familiar coffee coloured couch and sit down on it, glancing around the room.

Surprisingly, you hadn’t noticed the pictures put up around the living room yesterday when you had visited. They mainly consisted of photos of Karkat, his mother and who you’re assuming to be his father. His parents look happy and loving and god how you envy Karkat for that. There are also separate portraits of Karkat participating in different activities. All of them have one thing in common, and that is the fact that he isn’t smiling in any pictures.

He always looks so unhappy, and you wonder why. He has loving parents and a good house. He gets quality grades and remains in good shape. You could probably refer to him as perfection in a nutshell, although everyone has a dark side.  
Why the fuck are you thinking about him so much? You shake your head and check your phone to see a message from your best friend, John Egbert.

“Still coming over with the others tonight? –EB”

“Aw yeah man I wouldn’t miss it for the world –TG”

Today is December 4th and it is one of your best friend’s 17th Birthday. Her name is Rose Lalonde and she is the only person who really knows your secret. She is the only one who knows that you are attracted to males. Though you feel as if your bro has had his suspicions. 

You lock your phone and check your watch for the time. It’s literally been three minutes since you walked into this house. How does time go by so slowly? It’s as if time can understand when you want things to go a little longer. It’s like time feels sympathy for you. Time wants you to figure this guy out. Time is on your side. And you feel fucking privileged. 

Another minute passes and you finally see Karkat walking down his stairs. There are bags under his eyes and he is still in his pyjamas. And oh my god, do you feel the need to describe what he was wearing. Karkat’s pyjamas consisted of a pair of plain white boxer shorts and a black shirt sprawled with the words “will yuri for yaoi” in grey ink. You don’t think you’ll ever look at Karkat the same again. 

You let out a small smirk “Nice shirt, Karkles”

He gives you the most soul wrenching glare you had ever seen in your life.

“I bought this shirt when I was 14, asshole” he wipes the sleep out of his eyes and puts his dark, messy hair behind his pale ears. 

“Didn’t know that you read gay porn at such a young age, Vantas” You move a strand of white hair from your face. He glares at you once more before he leaves the room.

“Hey asshat, do you want any breakfast considering the fact that you’re here nine fucking hours early. Why are you here at this time in the morning anyway? Are you aware of the fact that is a fucking Sunday morning and I was trying to get some fucking rest? Oh my God” He continues to mumble about how you’re here so early as he pours two glasses of apple juice and prepares toast. What a fucking multi tasker. You just stare at him blankly hoping that he’ll eventually shut the fuck up. When he finally does, you explain why you are here.

“S’my best friend’s birthday tonight and I’d rather spend it by having her psycho analyse me than have you yell at me for not pronouncing a fucking word correctly”

He eyes you suspiciously   
“Fair enough. How long will you be pestering me for?”

“As long as it takes me to learn whatever you think will be necessary for the test on Tuesday” 

Browned bread pops out of the toaster. Its 9:35am 

You two are now sitting at Karkat’s breakfast table, eating your food in silence. You glance at each other every now and then, but that just makes it seem more awkward. So you two just sit there and continue eating your food. Five minutes passes and it’s still painfully awkward.

You take in the last sip of your apple juice just as Karkat finishes his toast and you two proceed to clear up the table. God, this is so fucking domestic.

“Okay, Dave. Let’s get down to business”

“to defeat the Huns”

“I swear to fucking God I am going to strangle you”

You give him a shaky smirk and proceed to take your Italian textbook out of your bag. Time to fucking get some work done. Karkat orders you to turn to page 26. Its titled “Hair and eye Colour”. You sigh. Is he just trying to make fun of you for being so fucking abnormal? He doesn’t even know your eye colour.

“What’s wrong, Strider? Think is too advanced?” He opens up his textbook to the same page and folds the corner over to substitute for a bookmark.

“Nothing, Karkat. Let’s just learn these phrases”

“alright, so basically when asking hair and eye colour in English, you say ‘my hair colour is blonde’ or whatever, correct?” You nod your head

“Well, with Italian instead of saying ‘hair’, you should say ‘hairs’. So when you tell me that you have blonde hair, you would say ‘Ho I capelli biondi’ which means ‘I have blonde hairs’, because we have more than one hair on our heads, don’t we? As you can tell, the Italians are way fuckin smarter than us” 

You think it over for a second. You guess it makes sense.

Hours pass and you can successfully answer the two questions “What colour is your hair?” and “What colour are your eyes?”

Karkat clears his throat and begins to speak “Di che colore sono I tuoi occhi?” (What colour are your eyes)

You smile sweetly and reply “Ho gli occhi none of your fucking business” (My eye colour is none of your fucking business)

“You weren’t speaking Italian then, asshole” He frowns and shifts over to you and tries to reach a hand out to your glasses. You quickly back away. Hello no. No one besides bro knows your eye colour. What makes this asshole think he has the privilege of seeing them? 

“I’m not telling you my eye colour, dude”

“Fine then, ask me what colour my eyes are”

“But I can already s-“

“Just fucking ask me”

You sigh deeply, and begin to talk  
“Di che colore sono I tuoi occhi?” (What colour are your eyes?)

“Ho gli occhi norri ole” (my eye colour is hazel)

He applauds you quietly as he closes his text book. You check your watch. Its only 1:00pm. Well shit, should you just leave now or hang around a little longer. You did want to get Karkat better, but you feel as if you’re unwanted. You really don’t want to go home though. Your brother might attempt to strife with you today and you don’t want to go to Rose’s with fresh scares scattered across your stomach. That reminds you, have your scars from last strife healed? You slide a hand under your shirt to feel thick lines travel across your torso. God, how you hated them.

In the past you always considered strifes with your bro as a punishment for being such a shitty person, but you now realise that he was training for you to protect yourself in the future if you were ever faced in an armed fight. You scrunch your nose at the fact that bro might actually care about you.

Are you going to stay at Karkat’s or not?


	3. Who the fuck said it was okay for italian romance movies to exist

You have decided that yes, you are going to stay at Karkat Vantas’ house also known as shoutty mc he needs to stop giving you stupid fucking nicknames.

You never really like to say that you hate people, but oh God do you hate Karkat Vantas. The only reason you are here is because your Italian teacher assumes that you need ‘extra help’ with this goddamn subject. You wouldn’t mind receiving help if it were from another classmate, but no. She decided that Karkat should help you. People are generally scared of you, and you can’t blame them. You’re insanely tall and quiet and emotionless in a way. Well, atleast you come off as emotionless. In reality you really are just a giant ball of emotions. 

Anyway, as you stated before, you have decided to stay at Karkat’s for a while considering the fact that you have nothing else to do. Karkat interrupts your train of thought. 

“You know what would help you study for this fucking piece of shit test, Dave?”

You raise an eyebrow “what?”

“A good old fashioned Italian romance comedy” he slides a cd out of his pocket. Where the fuck did he get that from?

You let out what probably would be the biggest sigh of your entire life. You never took Karkat as a person who was into romance comedies. Karkat really is unpredictable once you think about it. You remember seeing him on the first day of freshman year, rocking a black turtleneck and a pair of black jeans. You’re not going to lie; you thought he was some weird mime.

You also remember your first conversation with him. He asked you where the bathroom was and you said that you didn’t know and then he said ok. Good times.

You snap back to reality and begin to pay attention to the movie. You don’t understand one word in the entire movie. In fact, you don’t even know the plotline. Karkat on the other hand was fixed to the movie. He really did seem into this stuff. He still didn’t have a smile on his face though.

“Ti amo piu’ della mia vita” (I love you more than life)

“Vuoi Sposarmi?” (Will you marry me?)

“Ci!” (Yes!)

Karkat was still glued to the movie and you really couldn’t understand why. Like you said before, he’s unpredictable. You decide to mess around with him out of boredom.   
As you two were watching the insanely shitty movie, you decide to pull off the “I’m going to pretend that I’m yawning, but I’m really just gonna put my arm around your shoulder” move. You conclude to stretch your arms upwards and land one of them around Karkat’s shoulder. And you swear to fucking God that he gave you the weirdest look ever. You remind yourself that this is completely platonic. Shifting in a little closer, he eyes you. You have never seen Karkat this confused before, but he just lets it be and completely disregards the fact that you’re practically sitting on half of his leg.

So you continue to sit next to him with your arm around his shoulder for another thirty minutes or so before he gets up and states that he needs to go to the bathroom. Smooth move, Vantas.

He was totally into that, ha. You got him so good.

You gulp. 

Do you think sitting so closely was taking it too far? Maybe he got the wrong idea? What if he just thinks that you’re a creep now? Oh, God. You fucked up this time. Now he probably thinks that you’re some weird, gay guy (you basically are though). Is he going to tell the whole school on Monday about how you were all over him? What if he starts a rumour that you tried to kiss him or something? You shake your head and check your phone. Why are you such an idiot? You never considered yourself religious. You don’t even believe in God, but now you’re wondering why you didn’t accept your brother’s offer to go to church with him.

Karkat comes back a few minutes later, wiping his hands on his pockets and sits down next to you. You proceed to play the movie again before he pauses the image and turns to face you.

“Dave, why the fuck were you playing awkward middle school first date with me approximately ten minutes ago?”

You play it cool. “Just a little harmless fun, y’know? If you’re lucky, you’ll get a kiss before my mum comes to pick me up” Nailed it.

“That wasn’t funny, Dave. I seriously thought that you were hitting on me or something. Give me a warning before you do shit like that”. Oh

You intended for it to be harmless. And as much as you hate him, you kind of want Karkat to like you in a way. You don’t know. You just thought it’d be pretty cool if he went along with it because he actually enjoyed it. You kind of feel like an ass now.

“Aw, Karkles, it was just a joke” you make a pouty face

“Dave I swear to Jegus-“

“Jegus?”

“I MEANT Jesus. Anyway, I swear to Jesus Christ if you call me that one more fucking time”

“What, Karkles?” 

And that’s when Karkat fucking Vantas tackles you to his living room floor. Is he, oh hell no.

This bitch is trying to tickle you.

Hell  
Fucking  
No

You push Karkat off and proceed to put his arm into a not painful, but difficult lock. Causing him immense frustration. Karkat tries to fight you off, you don’t give in. You may appear to be insanely tall and thin, but all of those years strifing with bro have given you a high level of arm strength and reflexes. 

“Dave, let go of me!!”

“Not until you apologise for trying to tickle me”

“Fuck, fine! Oh my God, I’m sorry!”   
After those words were said, you lifted yourself off of Karkat. Shit, you were straddling him weren’t you? Your gay really is showing today, David Elizabeth Strider. You need a better disguise. You stand up, brush off your clothes, and check your watch. It is 5:30 pm. Shit, did you spend that long over at Karkat’s? 

A sudden rush of realisation hits you, you need to be at rose’s house in approximately 15 minutes, shit fuck shit. How are you going to get there in time? You could run, but her house is practically a 20 minute drive from here. Maybe Karkat has a bike? That’s a good idea. You can return it to him another time.

“Hey Karkat, do you have a bike I could borrow or something”

Karkat just stares at you for a minute “Why would you need a bike?”

“Rose, 15 minutes, birthday, I need to go”

“Relax, Strider. I’ll drive you there” He fishes a chain of keys out of his pocket. He can drive now???  
You two walk over to Karkat’s car. It’s a small, black ford that looks like it hasn’t been washed in ten years or so.

You proceed to ride to Rose’s house. Every now and then you would tell Karkat what street to turn into until finally you arrive. You nod towards Karkat and leave the car to walk over to The Lalonde house. Its fucking pyjama time up in this shit. You enter Rose’s house to be jumped on and pulled into a massive hug by Jade Harley. She’s been your bestfriend since about the age of twelve.

Following Jade’s tackle John and Rose also decide to hug the shit out of you too. Oh god, what did you do?

“Happy Birthday, Rose” You hand her a present as her eye’s immediately light up. You wonder if she’ll like your present.

She slowly unwraps the present, making sure not to dent or rip any of the edges to be faced with The complete Harry Potter limited edition book series. You have never seen Rose hug you so much. She was even grinning, godammit. She really likes her wizard fiction. Rose proceeds to open John’s and Jade’s present and also seems insanely happy with what she had received. The rest of the night consisted of us watching shitty movies and playing truth or dare, so all together it was pretty sweet.

Rose turns over to face your sleepingbag in the middle of the night

“How was Karkat’s?”

“It was okay.”

She raises an eyebrow “Just okay?”

“I kind of made things a little awkward today after we were studying. Its no big deal though”

“Are you willing to elaborate, Dave?”

You turn to fave your body to the ceiling “well, today I thought that I would play around with karkat yaknow? I was bored, so why not fuck with him”

“hmm go on”

“well, so I kind of flirted with him in a way. And he didn’t even flinch or anything. He kind of just left me there so sit really close with him and put my arm around his shoulder.”

Rose was kind of just staring at you now

“it was completely platonic, Rose. I don’t feel the way.”

“mhmmm..”

“well, don’t you have any verdict on this? Come on now, I’m pouring my fuckin heart out here. Look at this fucking mess on the floor” 

Rose clears her throat “I think you’re trying to hide the fact that you may have romantic feelings towards this person. Although, it’s too early in the story- I mean relationship to know yet. Yes, you’re right. This may be completely platonic, but just consider It. Goodnight Dave”

Before you could even reply, she was fast asleep. God, you sometimes hated how well she could ignore you. And how she also always knows how you feel. You decide to go to sleep now anyway. You have school tomorrow.


End file.
